


Flashbacks

by tptigger



Category: Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-23
Updated: 2009-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-05 02:42:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tptigger/pseuds/tptigger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Connor is more like his father than he knows.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flashbacks

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Emily](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emily/gifts).



> Disclaimer: Characters and situations are the property of Sarah Connor Pictures Inc., C-2 Pictures, and Warner Brothers Entertainment. They were created by James Cameron, Josh Friedman. No copyright infringement in intended.
> 
> Many thanks to Wildforce71 for the extra quick beta job on this. Especially since it couldn't decide which tense it wanted to be.

February, 2026

"George Sanchez, this is no time for fun and games..." A woman came, grabbing her son (at least Derek hoped it was her son) by the arm and pulling him away from a group of kids who appeared to be playing a modified version of Rock, Paper, Scissors.

"If I'm ever that bad to my kids, shoot me," came a quiet voice in his ear.

Derek jumped, mentally cursing himself for not noticing someone sneaking up behind him. Even if it was only his little brother.

"Kyle, for you to have kids you're going to stop worshipping at the alter of St. Sarah Connor and find yourself a real girl," Derek said, batting at Kyle affectionately.

"No, seriously, it's not like they were hurting anything," Kyle said. "They're _kids_."

"We're pretty vulnerable here, Kyle, they need to stay alert," Derek said. Man, he hated tunnel duty.

"You sound like Mad Eye Moody," Kyle huffed. "'Constant vigilance'."

"You just had to read him Harry Potter," Wisher said, forming up.

"If I'd known he'd run with it, I wouldn't have done it," Derek said. "'sides, it was Before."

"I'm going to have to keep you from getting in your kids' faces too much, aren't I?" Kyle asked.

"I'm never having kids."

* * *

December, 2007

Derek got home to the sound of the radio blaring top volume. Cameron didn't look pleased, nor was she saying anything. If she'd been human, he'd have thrown her a sympathetic glance.

As a machine, she should've known better and clicked off the music. Derek walked upstairs, not being especially quiet. He opened the door to John's room, to find the sixteen year old with his back turned, playing air guitar. He formed a gun with his thumb and forefinger, poking it into John's neck.

"Bang!"

John jumped forward, whirled, and spun, relaxing visibly when he recognized his "assailant." "Derek, I...."

"Couldn't hear me coming because you had the radio up too loud?" Derek asked, crossing his arms. "You should know better, John."

"I was just..."

"You should know better."

"Cameron was downstairs."

"What if Cameron was glitching?"

"Man, Derek, do you ever get sore from that stick up your ass?" John asked.

Derek reached up, rubbing his eyes. "Excuse me for not wanting anything to happen to you."

John paused. Sighed. "I'm not a machine."

"No," Derek said. "Which is another reason not to blast the music, you'll kill your ears."

"Well, I didn't, the great John Connor isn't deaf, is he?"

"Future's changing all the time, John," Derek said. "What if I let this go when someone else who was here instead didn't?"

"Would they be in my face all the time? I'd really like to trade."

Derek snorted. "You're worse than your father."

* * *

May, 2011

"Mom would've let me play with them," Kyle whined as Derek hauled him away from a pack of strange kids.

"Well, Mom's not here!" Derek said defensively. "And she wouldn't anyway, Kyle. Not here, not now. That can's sharp and covered with germs."

"OK, Derek, there's careful and there's paranoid," Kyle said. "I'm wearing shoes."

"What if it went up to your shins?" Derek said, indicating the growing gap between the tops of Kyle's shoes and the top of his pants.

"It's not my fault all I have to wear is floodwaters."

"Well, it's not my fault that the machines bombed Mervyn's and we can't just go and buy you new pants," Derek said. "It's not my fault that can could kill you. You want to get killed?"

"No," Kyle said, miserably.

Derek sighed. "Wanna thumb wrestle?"

* * *

December, 2007

"Wanna thumb wrestle?" John said.

Derek turned, unsure if John was joking or serious. He and John were outside, acting as backup to Sarah and Cameron (again, but this time Sarah really did have to go in and the alternative was leaving John alone with It) and Derek had to admit that even he was bored.

"Never mind," John said, turning towards the window.

"I taught your father how to thumb wrestle," Derek said.

It had the desired effect, and John turned back to look at him.

"He any good?"

"Got to be so he always beat me," Derek replied.

"What's the matter, afraid I inherited the old man's thumbs?" John asked waggling his eyebrows.

"Let's go, you little whipper snapper," Derek replied in his best old man voice.

* * *

March, 2026

"Come on, you whipper snappers, hurry it up," barked Stevens.

Derek and Kyle exchanged glances. "Whipper snappers?" they mouthed at each other, then hurried after their CO.

They squeezed through to the next tunnel, then Derek heard a noise. Without thinking, he pulled Kyle and Stevens back into a side tunnel.

"What are..."

"Shh," Derek said, desperately, cupping his ears to hear more. Stevens--who probably was willing to admit that his hearing was going if he was going to refer to Kyle and Derek as "whipper snappers"-- shut up. The three of them squeezed against the bulkhead as a woman who looked way too clean to be a tunnel rat slipped by.

"Gray?" Derek mouthed. He and Kyle were helping Stevens round up a few grays from an incursion.

Stevens nodded curtly, signaling with his hands what he wanted Kyle and Derek to do. Kyle circled around to the back, Derek to the front, and then Stevens stepped out from the side.

"Freeze," Kyle said.

* * *

January, 2008

"Freeze!"

Derek tensed as John's voice rang through the empty room. The man with the gun on him also tensed, though Derek suspected that it had more to do with the gun John was pointing at the base of his skull than the noise.

When had the kid learned to be that quiet?

"Give it to my friend there," John said, calmly.

The man's hand started shaking.

"Handle first, if you please," John said.

The man turned the gun around, handing it to Derek.

Derek took it.

"Now, how about you tell me about Skynet," John said.

"Never heard of it," the man said.

Derek cocked the stolen gun.

"I'm telling you, I've never heard of it, unless you're talking about a British TV network!"

"What about Calibris?" Derek prompted.

"They pay to me deliver the goods, that's all I know."

"So why the gun?" John asked.

"You see the crime reports lately, kid?"

"Against the wall," John said, pushing the guy unkindly against the side of the overpass. "I'll cover him, you check it out."

It was only later, as they were driving back home, that Derek noticed John fidgeting.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, fine," John replied, sounding as though he were anything but.

"No, you're not. What is it?"

"Just waiting for the inevitable post-mortem."

"You did good. I'm proud of you."

John blinked. "That's it?"

"We're alive, we got the information and all the parts, what more do you want?"

"You don't think pulling the gun on him when he had the safety on was a bad move?"

"Would've been dumber if he _hadn't_ had the safety on."

"I didn't sound like a douche when I told him to freeze?"

"You reminded me of your father."

With that, John fell silent. Derek was glad, because he could think of no higher praise than that.

End


End file.
